It's All In How You Die
by Lucillia
Summary: After Kenny had a fatal disagreement with a tree in 1179 rather than a fatal disagreement with tax collectors in 1182 and was subsequently introduced to the Game by a different Immortal, his life became an entirely different ballgame.
1. Prologue: Kindergarten Blues

"Did you really tell your kindergarten teacher to go fuck himself?" Duncan asked the small blond boy he was still having trouble believing was centuries older than he was, having apparently first died in 1179 if the story he'd heard was true. He knew he shouldn't have been, but he was faintly stunned by what the principal had told him over the phone when asking him to come and pick up the kid. Kenny hadn't taken to kindergarten all that well, and it certainly hadn't taken to him either.

Kenny who looked to be about seven and therefore too old for kindergarten which had been what had led up to the altercation with one of his classmates which the teacher just had to interfere with just shrugged his shoulders and followed the man out of the school building without saying a word on the subject. He'd always been a bit too reckless for his own good, and he'd learned long ago that trying to avoid the consequences of his actions was pointless because they'd almost always come back and bite him in the ass one way or another. Fortunately, he was adorable, and he'd been able to use that to mooch off of a certain subset of Immortals over the centuries, a type who were willing to shield him from the worst of the fallout from his misbehavior despite the fact that they intellectually knew he wasn't really anywhere near as young or as innocent as he looked.

He'd learned mooching from the best, as well as how to take without giving anything he didn't want to in return. His small size and innocent face were the two best tools in his arsenal, as well as his two greatest weaknesses. If his teacher who'd stayed with him all too briefly before moving on hadn't taught him how to run...

As Kenny followed his current guardian and protector to the car, he reflected that if he'd been just a little bit older before he'd died he could've very easily become a very effective headhunter considering the fact that he had always been able to find sanctuary with Immortals who wanted a child to care for, a child they wouldn't have to bury. Unfortunately, thanks to an unsturdy tree branch and his lack of sense, he completely lacked the necessary strength to behead anyone and the best he could do to get out of a challenge is stab his opponent and run for the nearest bit of Holy Ground. Rather than being the easy prey he could've been, Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod was the latest of a long line of Immortals he could spend maybe five years at the most mooching off of before he was forced to move on, dodge the headhunters, and find another benefactor.

Just as the Immortal who had found him staring up at the twilight sky wondering what the hell had happened had told him to, he would live, grow stronger, and save the fight for another day.


	2. Dying Can Change the World

The world as we know it is made up of a myriad of choices. Ours, and everyone else's. Around the time a poor couple's son named Kenneth was seven, a certain Immortal had once again been passing through the collection of nations that would one day be known as Great Britain. Also around the time Kenneth was seven, he had been about as innocent and carefree as it was possible for a child living on the edges of starvation in the Twelfth century to be.

The reason Methos had been passing through could've been summed up in one statement: "For the hell of it". Methos went where he wanted to when he wanted to unless someone he didn't want to deal with got there first, and then he would go somewhere else.

The reason Kenneth was still innocent was this: He had not seen death beyond what was normal in his society at the time, and still had two parents who loved and cared for him as if he were their own child.

It was also when Kenneth was around seven years of age that two worlds diverged slightly. Most probably wouldn't have noticed the shift all that much, but it was there, and hundreds of years later it would be more apparent in the difference in the ratio of relatively decent Immortals to homicidal maniac Immortals with slightly more of the decent ones being there than there should've been. Seeing as most if not all of the major historical events had happened in both worlds since with a few exceptions here and there Immortals tended to hang around the edges rather than the actual center of things where they'd be noticed, it would probably only be a historian who would notice the difference in epic historical quotes and maybe a difference in minor participants that marked the two worlds as truly different should they ever be compared.

For one eternal child however, the world was a wildly different place, and it was so because he had been just a smidge too brave. Because he had that extra bit of courage, he had grabbed the tree branch that moved towards him when he pulled, pulled himself upward, climbed atop it, straddled it, reached for the next branch above, and fell screaming to the ground as the branch he had been sitting on cruelly gave way with a wicked snap.

The year was 1179, and a certain group of Norman tax collectors were not due for another three years. Neither was a thief who would teach a traumatized young boy the rules of the Game and show him his greatest weapon before being the source of the second great bit of trauma in his life when she was hung as a thief by those who had killed his parents. The first words Kenneth heard after he had awoken to see a twilit sky where seemingly moments before there had been a sunny morning one which was a reminder that he was slacking off from his chores were "I should probably kill you. It would be a mercy if I did.". They had been spoken by a man who was old as all adults were in the eyes of a child, a man that Kenneth who knew just about everyone for miles around had never seen before.

Those had been the first words that Kenneth had ever heard from his teacher whom he would learn centuries later was also the oldest known Immortal. Back then, all the boy knew about him was that he was a wanderer who traded as little of what he had at the time as he possibly could for what he wanted, be it a meal or a warm bed with company. Actually, back then, when Kenneth had first heard those words upon awakening, he had not known the man at all, nor why he would think killing him was a mercy since he wasn't crippled or going to be, as a brief examination of himself after awakening had revealed that he wasn't injured, and aside from a strange buzzing sensation in his head, he felt normal.

Kenneth, knowing that it wasn't smart to stay near anyone who spoke so casually of killing found the wherewithal to finally pick himself up off the ground and run for home where he knew a punishment would be waiting for him seeing as he had skipped an entire day's worth of chores. When he had gotten home in record time having run the entire way constantly looking over his shoulder to see if the man who had talked of killing him had followed, there had been some yelling and a clout around the head from his father, and no supper that night.

The next morning the man who Kenneth had run from the night before had been standing at the edge of the plot of land on which his family lived waiting for him.


	3. A Student of the Road

Nowadays, most people would be horrified if someone sent their child off to live with a stranger they'd never seen before. Nowadays, most parents wouldn't even consider such a thing unless the situation truly were dire, either that or unless they were truly horrible parents who didn't deserve to be such in the first place. In the Twelfth century however, just about everyone who'd heard had congratulated Kenneth on his good fortune when a wanderer of obvious means had walked off with the boy and the two had continued going until they were out of sight, never to be seen again.

The promise of good food and an education for their son as well as monetary compensation had been what had swayed Kenneth's parents. Being dirt-poor and barely able to get by each year, the idea that the child they raised and thought of as their own being educated like a noble and possibly even meeting some nobles had appealed to them. Of course they'd thought it strange that someone would come to their home and choose Kenneth, but then again Kenneth was a smart child, as well as a child who had a tendency to wander, so it was quite possible that the boy had caught the eye of someone important while he had been out playing when he should've been working.

Seven was an acceptable age at which to enter an apprenticeship after-all. That, and John son of Adam was a decent well-spoken man who hadn't even raised his hand to the boy after he had asked an impertinent question, so it wasn't like the boy would be ill-treated or any more ill-treated than a lowly apprentice normally was. Kenneth's mother was naturally sad that her son would be leaving, and his father knew he would seriously miss the boy who had been their only child, but the boy was going on to far better than they could provide for him, and the sizable amount of money they'd been given which was far more than they'd informed their neighbors of could see to their care in their old age if it were carefully saved. There was that, and the hope that one day Kenneth would return from his travels much wealthier than he had been when he left.

Kenneth was frankly scared shitless as he followed the man who'd emptied his coin-purse out completely in order to procure him past the well-wishers and busy-bodies who'd wanted a bit of gossip for the long evenings and away from everything he knew. The man had spoken of killing him the night before after-all, and he'd heard half-whispered stories about people who do horrible things to children amongst other things that were shared around the fire when he should've been asleep. He followed however, because he didn't know what would happen to his parents or anyone else who might've come to aid him if he'd run screaming from the man who carried a beautifully crafted, well tended to, and obviously well used sword on his person along with the usual knife everyone carried. The man could've easily killed him without paying his parents for the privilege of doing so after-all.

It was when the two were alone in the woods miles farther from his home than he'd ever been that the man had sat Kenneth down and informed him about why he could never ever return home. When he'd fallen out of the tree he'd been playing in when he should've been tending to the garden, he had died. And because he had died, he would never ever grow up or grow older than he was, and there were people everywhere who would hunt him down because of this.

"Was it because I was bad?" he finally asked when the man had finished talking about the Game that Immortals played for a prize that the man had informed him that he would not win.

He had disobeyed his parents, and because he had done so, he had died and been taken away from everything he knew. The priest had once told him that God would punish the wicked, and by not obeying his parents like he should've, he'd been very wicked indeed.

"No child." the man who was called John said, running his hand through his hair and giving him a sad smile. "It wasn't anything you did."

"Then why?" he asked.

"It is the way our kind are born." the man said, a strange darkness entering his hazel eyes.

That night, they had slept out near the road, but since it had been a warm night it was little problem for them. The next morning, they set to walking again, and when they reached another town the man who had taken Kenneth from his home had traded songs and stories for their supper and a place to stay the night. Things continued in much the same pattern with John singing for their supper after a day or so on the road until the two of them reached a great city that John told him had once been called Londinium.


End file.
